Halifax, NS, Canada 2019 – NNs On the Wind

September 23, 2019November 30, 2019 Kathleen Ennen

SEP 20-22, 2019 – Halifax, NS

It was a short drive to Woodhaven Campground in NW Halifax on September 20. We stopped on the way to pick up a rental car to make it easier to get around. We’d be visiting the city as well as visiting friends from DC and their two boys now much more grown up than when we last saw them years ago.

With some emailing and patience we were able to get reciprocal privileges at the Royal Nova Scotia Yacht Squadron. We wanted to take our friends out to dinner Saturday night and this seemed a great location. It was fun to look at the boats and enjoy the lower harbor views. Beautiful spot!!!

Halifax is known for its extremely well protected and deep harbor that doesn’t freeze in the winter. It is well fortified with several forts including the very large Citadel on a hill overlooking the city and the harbor. The waterfront is filled with shops, a terrific produce/farmer’s market and has great vistas and walks. Additionally the ferry is fun to take across and back for good views.

Unfortunately, but interestingly enough, when Hurricane Dorian blew through Halifax a tower crane collapsed in the downtown area. Nearby residents saw it and put videos on youtube and several shops had to be evacuated for fear of additional collapse. When we walked by, nearly two weeks after the collapse, the street was still close and the twisted parts of the crane were easy to see. WE walked around to the back as well and saw how much was damaged.

On Sunday as we walked around, we heard music and found a concert going on in the bandstand in the park where Sunday afternoon concerts had been happening all summer. It was the last of the season and it was a beautiful sunny day and many people were out enjoying the music.

We have traveled over the years and retired in 2017, when we started on a nine month long adventure departing in December 2017. In the past we’ve traveled to Sri Lanka, Africa (several times), Turkey, and made a number of trips to Europe, and St Lucia. Our 2015 trip to Turkey, took nearly 3 weeks to explore Istanbul, Cappadocia and the areas in proximity to Izmir.

This is a chronicle of our travels, past and present. We love to travel by trains, planes, ships, and cars – and love sailing whenever and wherever we can.

We retired from the US General Services Administration, the Federal Government’s landlord! Thom worked at planning and large scale program management of numerous projects and Kathleen, a registered professional civil engineer, was a project manager for many infrastructure and building renovation projects, including both design and construction aspects, in New England, Florida and the metro DC area. We lived in Washington DC for 12 years and upon retirement sold the house, putting a few things in a 5’x5’ storage unit and started traveling.

On return to the US in September 2018, after traveling to 21 countries, we bought a Class C RV – 2019 Thor Freedom Elite 24FE. We enjoyed our week long camping trip in New Zealand in a small converted van with few amenities, so this seemed liked a good way to tour the US. We hope to visit family along the way and as many US National Parks as possible.

UPDATE – the Covid pandemic made travel more difficult for us. We were abroad for several months when the pandemic started and returned to the US in July 2020. After several months in the RV to visit Utah and Albuquerque NM, we moved east, bought a house on the Northern Neck of Virginia, and sold the RV. For 2021 and 2022 we tended to our new house and cottage, gardens and various boats including a 18’ 1977 Marshall Sanderling catboat and a 25’ Steiger Craft Chesapeake fishing boat, and kayaks and a canoe. Hopefully travel will start again one day!!

May 2022